List of important geographical names with Iranian origins

[Serpentine]

This thread is absolutely for educational purposes

Afghanistan
Formed with the Persian suffix -istan, it literally means "Land of Afghans" in Persian.

Armenia:
The exonym Armenia is attested in the Old Persian Behistun inscription as Armina, and introduced into Greek by Herodotus as Ἀρμένιοι "Armenians", who in his review of the troops opposing the Greeks wrote that "the Armenians were armed like the Phrygians, being Phrygian colonists.

Azerbaijan
The Republic of Azerbaijan gets its name from the Iranian region known as Azerbaijan. The name Azerbaijan is thought to be derived from Atropates, the Satrap (governor) of Media in the Achaemenid empire, who ruled a region found in modern Iranian Azarbaijan called Atropatene. Atropates name is believed to be derived from the Old Persian roots meaning "protected by fire." The name is also mentioned in the Avestan Frawardin Yasht: âterepâtahe ashaonô fravashîm ýazamaide which translates literally to: We worship the Fravashi of the holy Atare-pata.

Georgia
It is conjectured that the word "Georgia" derived from the Ancient Persian word Gurj or Gorg, meaning Gorgeous in Proto-Indo-European languages . Some also believed that Georgia was so named by the Greeks on account of its agricultural resources, since "Georgia" (γεωργί&#945 means "farming" in Greek. However, the true origin of the name Georgia is still disputed and unknown.

Kazakhstan
Formed with the Persian suffix -istan, literally meaning "land of the Kazakh or Ghazagh" in Persian.

Kyrgyzstan
Formed with the Persian suffix -istan means "Land of Kirgyz or Gherghiz" in Persian.

Tajikistan
Tajik combined with Persian suffix -stan.Literally meaning "Land of Tajiks" in Persian.

Turkmenistan
Means land of Turkmen in Persian.

Uzbekistan
Uzbek combined with Persian suffix -stan. Literally meaning "Land of Uzbeks" in Persian

China

The English name of China comes from the Qin Dynasty, possibly in a Sanskrit form; the pronunciation "China" came to the western languages through the Persian word چین "Chin".

Iran

The name of Iran derives immediately from Middle Persian Ērān, Pahlavi ʼyrʼn, first attested in this form in the inscription that accompanies the investiture relief of Ardashir I at Naqsh-e Rustam. In this inscription, the king's Middle Persian appellation is ardašīr šāhān šāh ērān (lit. "Ardeshir, king of kings of Eran") corresponding to the passage ardašīr šāhān šāh aryān (lit. Ardashir, king of kings of Aryans) in the Parthian inscription accompanying the Middle Persian one. Though in English the name Persia was once the norm, Iran is today the preferred name.

Iraq

One theory is that it is derived from the city of Erech/Uruk (also known as "Warka") near the river Euphrates. Some archaeologists regard Uruk as the first major Sumerian city. However, it is more plausible that name is derived from the Middle Persian word Erak, meaning "lowlands". The natives of the southwestern part of today's Iran called their land "the Persian Iraq" for many centuries (for Arabs: Iraq ajemi: non-Arabic-speaking Iraq). Before the constitution of the state of Iraq, the term "Iraq arabi" referred to the region around Baghdad and Basra.

India

The name India is derived from Indus, which is derived from the Old Persian word Hind. The name of Indus River in Old Persian. The word Hindu is also originated from Old Persian means people who live beyond the Indus River and it is originally referred to people not religion.

Furthermore, the name "Hindustan", a name for North India, is Persian derived.It is a place where the majority of Muslims in India are concentrated (as South India was largely unaffected by Muslim invasions).Persians, Turks, and Arabs as well as other races such as Mongols, Kushans,Sakas ruled North India and hence North India has a huge Middle Eastern Influence.

Pakistan
Formed with the Persian suffix "-istan"
The Cambridge student and Muslim nationalist Choudhary Rahmat Ali coined this name. He devised the word and first published it on 28 January 1933 in the pamphlet "Now or Never". He constructed the name as an acronym of the different states/homelands/regions, which broke down into: P=Punjab, A=Afghania (Ali's preferred name for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), K=Kashmir, S=Sindh and the suffix -stan from Balochistan, thus forming "Pakstan". An "i" intruded later to ease pronunciation. The suffix -stan in Persian means "home of" and in Sanskrit means "place". Rahmat Ali later expanded upon this in his 1947 book Pakistan: the Fatherland of the Pak Nation. In that book he explains the acronym as follows: P=Punjab, A=Afghania, K=Kashmir, I=Indus Valley, S=Sindh, T=Turkharistan (roughly the modern central-Asian states), A=Afghanistan and N=BalochistaN. The Persian word پاک pāk, which means "pure", adds another shade of meaning, with the full name thus meaning "land of the pure".

Other important geographical names (for further reading,see the sources)
Arran
Kura River
Amudarya
Khwarezm
Herat
Jalalabad
Mazar-i Sharif
Astana
Dushanbe
Ashgabat
Samarkand
Zeravshan
Danube River
Tatarstan
Sakha Republic
Dagestan
Strait of Hormuz
Baghdad
Anbar
Basra
Adapazari
Aksaray
Akşehir
Alaşehir
Eceabat
Erzincan
Eskişehir
Gümüşhane
Dubai
Punjab
Zanzibar


Rememer that origins of some names can not be confirmed definitively.


List of geographic names of Iranian origin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_country-name_etymologies

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

China

The English name of China comes from the Qin Dynasty, possibly in a Sanskrit form; the pronunciation "China" came to the western languages through the Persian word چین "Chin".

Yes, I have heard this as well. The word "Qin" was tranlisterated into Persian and became "Chin", which became China.

(In our own language though, we call our country "Zhong guo" which means the Middle Kingdom.)

 

[Serpentine]

Yes, I have heard this as well. The word "Qin" was tranlisterated into Persian and became "Chin", which became China.

(In our own language though, we call our country "Zhong guo" which means the Middle Kingdom.)

One of things on my wish list is visiting China some day.I love your country,it's culture,people,land,from great wall of China to Himalayas,China has been always a mysterious and beautiful land for me and leaves me a lot of things to discover.

There are some countries that i should visit before i die,one of them is China,i don't mention others as it may lead to a serious argument.

 

[DRaisinHerald]

Pakistan
Formed with the Persian suffix "-istan"
The Cambridge student and Muslim nationalist Choudhary Rahmat Ali coined this name. He devised the word and first published it on 28 January 1933 in the pamphlet "Now or Never". He constructed the name as an acronym of the different states/homelands/regions, which broke down into: P=Punjab, A=Afghania (Ali's preferred name for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), K=Kashmir, S=Sindh and the suffix -stan from Balochistan, thus forming "Pakstan". An "i" intruded later to ease pronunciation. The suffix -stan in Persian means "home of" and in Sanskrit means "place". Rahmat Ali later expanded upon this in his 1947 book Pakistan: the Fatherland of the Pak Nation. In that book he explains the acronym as follows: P=Punjab, A=Afghania, K=Kashmir, I=Indus Valley, S=Sindh, T=Turkharistan (roughly the modern central-Asian states), A=Afghanistan and N=BalochistaN. The Persian word پاک pāk, which means "pure", adds another shade of meaning, with the full name thus meaning "land of the pure".

Actually, both Pak and Stan are Urdu words as well, probably of Persian origin, but not Irani origin lol

 

[Desert Fox]

Actually, both Pak and Stan are Urdu words as well, probably of Persian origin, but not Irani origin lol

Its Farsi, which is spoken in Iran and some parts of central Asia, even Afghanistan but they speak a dialect known as Dari.


Pakistan's National Anthem is also in Farsi:


National Anthem of Pakistan (

 

[DRaisinHerald]

^ I can understand 70% of the national anthem easily, yet when Farsi is being spoken I don't understand even the simplest words. So while the anthem might be Persianised Urdu, it's certainly not Farsi

Its Farsi, which is spoken in Iran and some parts of central Asia, even Afghanistan but they speak a dialect known as Dari.

Yes, I'm sure they are Farsi words, but they are also Urdu words.
I mean, what alternative words to we have for "pak" and "stan".

By the way, did you guys know in Hindi Pakistan can be called Shuddhrashtra? lol

 

[Desert Fox]

^ I can understand 70% of the national anthem easily, yet when Farsi is being spoken I don't understand even the simplest words.

Neither can i understand old English or the Urdu in Allama Iqbal's poetry entirely. The only reason why you can understand Pakistan's National Anthem is because you have been listening to it since childhood and know its meaning since, and you have only heard the pronunciation of the Anthem's words from the way we Pakistanis pronounce it, which is not the way its supposed to be pronounced, and secondly, Farsi is composed of more than just Pakistan's anthem so of course you wouldn't understand the other words except for the ones in our national anthem.

So while the anthem might be Persianised Urdu, it's certainly not Farsi

There is no such thing as "persianized Urdu":

"The lyrics are written in Urdu, with some claiming that it is a Persianized form of Urdu, which is a moot point since Urdu and Persian share many common words and the Urdu vocabulary derives heavily from Persian vocabulary. Indeed, there are no words in the Qaumi Tarana that are exclusively Persian and not part of Urdu."

Yes, I'm sure they are Farsi words, but they are also Urdu words.
I mean, what alternative words to we have for "pak" and "stan".

Urdu borrowed these words from Farsi, not the other way around. So these words (Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Khurasan, etc) are all originally Farsi or Persian words.

 

[Al-zakir]

By the way, did you guys know in Hindi Pakistan can be called Shuddhrashtra? lol

How do you know Hindi(Sanskrit)?

 

[Serpentine]

^ I can understand 70% of the national anthem easily, yet when Farsi is being spoken I don't understand even the simplest words. So while the anthem might be Persianised Urdu, it's certainly not Farsi



Yes, I'm sure they are Farsi words, but they are also Urdu words.
I mean, what alternative words to we have for "pak" and "stan".

By the way, did you guys know in Hindi Pakistan can be called Shuddhrashtra? lol

Why don't you understand all of the anthem?Is your language something other than Urdu?
You know better than me that Urdu borrows most of its vocabulary from Persian,so when we say Pak is Persian word,it doesn't contradict the fact that it is also an Urdu word.
In Pakistan anthem there is only one Hindi word 'کا' while all the other words are Persian (Urdu).
I understand almost all the words and a good part of the meaning,but i have some difficulties to understand some other parts.

 

[aakash_2410]

Agree with everything else but suffix -stan is not exclusively Iranian term. It's an Indo-Iranian term. It has the same meaning in both Iranins and Indo-Aryan languages.

"The suffix -stan (-stân, -ston, -stān, spelled ـستان in the Persian alphabet) is Persian for "place of", a cognate to Pashto -tun and in Indo-Aryan languages (Sanskrit), sthāna means "place", and is cognate to the Latin terms state and status."

Because of the common place of origin there are heavy similarities between these languages.
-stan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[KS]

India

The name India is derived from Indus, which is derived from the Old Persian word Hind. The name of Indus River in Old Persian. The word Hindu is also originated from Old Persian means people who live beyond the Indus River and it is originally referred to people not religion.

I disagree.

Indus was derived from the word "Sindhu", which was the sanskrit name of the river and not from any persian word....Indus was what the Greeks called the Sindhu...

Now I dont know why the Persians referred to as Hind...maybe because of lack of some consonants,sounds or whatever.

 

[Water Car Engineer]

India

The name India is derived from Indus, which is derived from the Old Persian word Hind. The name of Indus River in Old Persian. The word Hindu is also originated from Old Persian means people who live beyond the Indus River and it is originally referred to people not religion.

Furthermore, the name "Hindustan", a name for North India, is Persian derived.It is a place where the majority of Muslims in India are concentrated (as South India was largely unaffected by Muslim invasions).Persians, Turks, and Arabs as well as other races such as Mongols, Kushans,Sakas ruled North India and hence North India has a huge Middle Eastern Influence.

Wrong


India , doesnt come from Persia.

How ever Hindu, Hind comes from Persians.

India comes from Indus river. Indus is Greek word. Persians got the word "Hindu" also from river indus. The indigenous Sanskrit name was Sindhu , Persians couldn't say this right so it became Hindu.

Indus-Indie-India-Indian-Indo, etc <---This part came from the Europeans(Greeks to French)
Sindhu-Hindu-Hind-Hindustan-Hindustani <---Bold part is Persian, Arabic, etc
Bharat <--- Indigenous

China

The English name of China comes from the Qin Dynasty, possibly in a Sanskrit form; the pronunciation "China" came to the western languages through the Persian word &#1670;&#1740;&#1606; "Chin".

This is wrong too.

Chin, was sanskrit. People in the plains of India called them "Chin". Most proabably referring to Tibetians, not the Hans.

 

[ihealugo]

as u know pakistan was a part of india and then it was seprated. as pakistan's people were muslim and indian people were praying cows and etc ... , they called it pakistan , it means they are clean, because they pray god ....
&#1740;&#1705;&#1740; &#1575;&#1740;&#1606; &#1585;&#1608; &#1607;&#1605; &#1578;&#1585;&#1580;&#1605;&#1607; &#1705;&#1606;&#1607;: &#1607;&#1606;&#1583;&#1740; &#1607;&#1575; &#1705;&#1575;&#1601;&#1585; &#1576;&#1608;&#1583;&#1606;&#1583; &#1608; &#1606;&#1580;&#1587; &#1662;&#1587; &#1670;&#1608;&#1606; &#1575;&#1740;&#1606;&#1575; &#1605;&#1587;&#1604;&#1605;&#1608;&#1606; &#1576;&#1608;&#1583;&#1606;&#1583; &#1608; &#1662;&#1575;&#1705; &#1576;&#1607;&#1588;&#1608;&#1606; &#1605;&#1740; &#1711;&#1606;&#1583; &#1662;&#1575;&#1705;&#1587;&#1578;&#1575;&#1606;

 

[Rig Vedic]

The "stan" ending comes from the Sanskrit "Sthan" which is an independent word meaning "place".

Does "Stan" exist as an independent word in Persian?

 

[Bratva]

How Much Iqbal Lahori Persian Poetry is famous in Iran?